History Repeats Itself

For almost 15 years after World War I, the British army occupied the country we now call Iraq — at that time the British called it Mesopotamia. Their main interest was protecting the oil fields and refineries in southern Iraq owned by the Anglo-Persian Oil Company (which changed its name in 1954 to British Petroleum and then again in 2000 to simply BP). They exerted military control over the country by means of the large bases they built outside the cities of Basra and Baghdad.

Iraqis grew increasingly resentful of the foreign presence and in the summer of 1920 full-scale revolt broke out. The “Grand Mujtahid of Karbala,” Imam Shirazi, issued a fatwa decreeing jihad against the foreign infidels. Insurgents staged increasingly effective guerilla attacks on British military patrols. The British retaliated against the pro-insurgent town of Fallujah by leveling it with a month-long artillery bombardment. Then Shiites and Sunnis began turning on each other, with many civilian massacres. The entire country plunged into chaos and war, which lasted until the British finally left in 1932.

In 1920, a London Times editorial asked, “How much longer are valuable lives to be sacrificed in the vain endeavour to impose upon the Arab population an elaborate and expensive administration which they never asked for and do not want?”

The Daily Express published the following political cartoon in 1922:

According to exchange rate and inflation data available here and here, the £50 million per year Britons complained about in 1922 would be equivalent to $2.8 billion per year now. Our current annual expenditures in Iraq are at least 50 times that.